Effect of Nutrition Labelling on Demand for Agro-Fruit Juice in Abakaliki Urban Area of Ebonyi State, Nigeria

Abstract

The demand for agro-fruit juice has been on the increase in Nigeria.  Despite its increasing demand, there seems to be a dearth of empirical data on the influence of nutrition labelling on consumers demand of agro-fruit juice in Abakaliki urban area of Ebonyi State, Nigeria. The study specifically, analyzed the ability of consumers to recognized nutrition labelling information and how this influenced the demand for agro-fruits juice. A multi-stage random sampling technique was used in the selection of respondents for the study. Data were collected primarily using well structured questionnaires and the data analysed using both descriptive and inferential statistics. The result of the analysis showed that the mean age of the consumers was 37 years and who are mostly females with an average household size of 4 persons and who earn an average income of N187,200.00. The result further revealed that health claims, date of production and expiration, geographical place of origin, nutritional claims, and safety claims were the major factors that influenced the demand for agro-fruit juice label.  With the R² of 0.860, the study at P=0.05 level of significance found that nutrition information has significant effect on the demand of agro-fruit juice.  Similarly, with the R² of 0.946 the coefficient of age, gender, and primary occupation, was negatively related to the demand level of agro-fruit juice label. Again, the result showed that that coefficient of household size, educational level, annual income, and membership of social organisation were positively signed and statistically significant. The study also showed that misleading health claims on agro-fruit juice, falsified nutrition information, lack of interest in agro-fruit juice label information, numerous information content of agro-fruit juice label, and obscure and unclear information on agro-fruit juice were the major constraints to demand for agro-fruits juice nutrition labels. Based on the findings of this study recommended that food regulatory agencies such as NAFDAC should ensure that nutrition information on food label depict the actual quality and claims of its nutritional content; and that producers should ensure that the practice of inscribing unnecessary logos, signs and letters on food labels which carry little or no information should be discouraged.

Keywords: nutrition labelling, influencing, demand, agro-fruit, juice, Abakaliki